Beer Man: Sam Adams carves out autumn niche with Fat Jack

Oct. 17, 2012

Written by

Todd Haefer

For The Post-Crescent

Fat Jack Double Pumpkin Ale

Apparently even pumpkin beers are now so common around the United States that they are being transformed into imperial beers to make them stand out.

I don’t think this is necessarily a bad thing — some of the flavored beers I’ve had don’t stand up well with thin bodies and adding more malt goes a long ways toward balancing them out. This is the case with Samuel Adams Fat Jack.

As with some of the brewery’s other specialty beers, such as Norse Legend, Vixen and Griffin’s Bow, Fat Jack starts off with a rich malt base. In this case, it is caramel with some roasted notes that provide a solid foundation for the rest of the flavors. The color is a reddish-orange body with a tan head.

The pumpkin flavor comes through nicely while not being overdone; it’s more pure pumpkin than some of the pumpkin beers that are bready like a pumpkin pie, crust and all. This is not a bad thing, just a distinction to note.

The cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice all come through in Fat Jack, along with the unusual addition of ginger. This spice normally doesn’t thrill me in a beer, but it worked very well when mixed in with the other spices.

I’ve been reading comments for years about Samuel Adams becoming too much like a macrobrewery. Well, technically, they now are, but I much prefer a Samuel Adams Boston Lager on tap than what is still taking up most of the taps in the country.

What is more important is that the company has not lost its innovation as a brewer of craft beers, and as long as it is still making beers like Fat Jack, the Latitude 48 series, the 27-percent ABV Utopias, the Longshot homebrew series and many others, it is a macrobrewery unlike any other.

Samuel Adams beers are sold throughout the country, but take note that supplies of Fat Jack will be limited. On the bottom left of the Samuel Adams’ home Web page is a “Find a Sam Near You” zip code locator link.